What To Do When You Have No Hope of Rescue
by Trillian Astra
Summary: The Losties have been on the island 16 years, and they've settled down with kids. [EDITED VERSION]Disclaimer: No, still not mine. Please read and review.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: Okay, I've been reading a few fics recently where the Losties don't get rescued and end up settled with kids on the island, so I thought I'd try writing my own version. I should point out that this fic is AU, to the extent that Shannon survived being shot and Ana-Lucia and Libby are also still alive. Boone and Eko are still dead though. **

**Pairings for this are Skate, Jana, Jun, Hurley/Libby, Karl/Alex, Daire, Shayid.**

**This chapter is really just a prologue to get things started, and an introduction to link what's happening in the show to this fic, as well as introducing the children.**

**(Oh, and this fic starts 16 years post-crash.)**

**Disclaimer: I don't own this, don't sue me. **

**Please read and review, as always.**

**What To Do When You Have No Hope of Rescue**

Prologue – Claire

_Running_

_Running through the jungle, desperate, legs aching and lungs burning from the exertion, but still unable to stop. Branches whip across my face and arms but I don't notice…_

_And I emerge from the jungle into a clearing, and I hear my baby's cries. I follow his cries and find him wrapped in a blanket hidden behind a bush. I hold him to my chest, trying to calm him, then I see it. Just a few feet away, lying on the ground. A piece ripped from Charlie's t-shirt, stained with blood. Still holding the baby, I run over, and I see him lying there covered in blood. I kneel next to him, praying that I'll find a pulse, but there isn't one. _

_I break down in tears, screaming out to the jungle. _

And then I'm awake. I find myself sitting upright in bed, in my house on the beach. I can see my kids asleep nearby, and I turn around to see him lying next to me, propped up on his elbows. His dark hair – too long, as usual, but I'll never persuade him to let me cut it – is all mussed up from when he was asleep, and I can see concern in his dark eyes.

"Claire? Are you all right?"

"I… I had that nightmare again… it felt so real.."

"Hey, it was just a dream, I'm here, nothing can hurt you…"

"I know… I will be okay, it's just.. I need… I need time…"

"You can have all the time in the world, you know that, right?"

"Yeah." He put his arms around me, so I could rest my head on his shoulder.

"Anything you need, anything at all, just remember I'm here for you."

"I will. But I think I ought to be getting up now. And so should you, didn't you want to talk to Jack about something?"

"All right, all right, I'm getting up."

I pushed my hair back from my face, and started to find clothes to wear. I ended up with a camisole and a long skirt, but concluded that I was definitely going to need to do some washing today.

-------------------------

It had been sixteen years since Oceanic Airlines Flight 815 crashed on the island. A lot had happened to the forty or so survivors, and many had died in the first year after the crash, but still no rescue party had ever come. So the surviving passengers did the only thing they could – they built new lives for themselves on the island. About three months after the crash, Jack, Kate and Sawyer were kidnapped by "the Others" – and after three weeks Kate and Sawyer returned without Jack.

That led to Kate, Sayid, Locke and Ana-Lucia setting out to find the Others and rescue Jack. They were successful – but as well as Jack they also brought back Alex, Juliet, Cindy and the two children who had been kidnapped just after the crash, Emma and Zach.

No-one knew quite what would happen, but when the Others offered to make a truce with them – in which they would keep to their half of the island and the survivors would keep to theirs – they considered the offer and decided as a group that they would accept. It was likely that they would be on the island for a long time, and everyone could see that it was better to live peacefully together than to always be on the lookout.

So the Truce was made. The Flight 815 survivors – led by their _de facto_ leader, Jack – had the south side of the island, and the Others had the north side. They lived in peace. The Others knew that some of them (Juliet, Alex and Karl) had joined the crash survivors, but Juliet was considered almost an outcast among the Others anyway, and Alex and Karl had nothing to tie them to the Others, so they were allowed to go.

It seemed like everything was going to be okay. The crash survivors had a place of safety to live in, and they still hoped that rescue would come. Michael and Walt had even returned to beach camp, after discovering that they had been given false directions.

They were still hoping almost a year after the crash, when Sun gave birth to a daughter. And when Shannon gave birth to her and Sayid's son, they still hoped to see a rescue ship on the horizon.

And so the months and years passed. They built proper houses for themselves. They paired off into couples. Some of the couples decided to get married – though the ceremonies were informal at best, and the only person they had to perform them was Desmond, seeing as he had technically been captain of a boat. The various couples "married", and children were born… and soon they had to build a school-hut, with each of the adults teaching the children something. They had a proper little village there on the beach, and so when Claire woke up from her nightmare that morning, they had been there sixteen years and no-one really thought they would be rescued.

It had not all been good news, though. People had died on the island. Michael had succumbed to "the sickness" soon after he and Walt returned to the island. Jack had tried to treat him, but had found that all he could do was make him comfortable as he passed away. So many people died from the sickness that they came to call it the "Goodnight Syndrome", because the people who contracted it would simply fall asleep as they died.

After Michael, about two dozen of the crash survivors died. Cindy first, then Paulo, then Nikki, then so many others. Somehow, the other survivors were not affected, and Jack thought that perhaps they had acquired some kind of immunity - most of the unaffected survivors had been on trips into the jungle at least once, and he thought that the increased exposure to the island might have protected them. Either that, or they were just lucky.

And it wasn't just the Goodnight syndrome. Six years after the crash, and when his and Claire's son Charlie Junior was only two years old, Charlie was mauled by a polar bear in the jungle. Little Charlie had wandered off, and he had gone to find him. When Charlie did not return with the little boy after several hours, people started to worry about him. Claire was going out of her mind with worry, and though Jack assured her they would look for Charlie she decided to find him herself. She left Sun keeping an eye on Aaron, and headed off into the jungle alone.

So, when Desmond found her house empty, he realised where she'd gone and headed off after her with Hurley. When they found her, she was crying her eyes out in a jungle clearing, kneeling next to Charlie's bloodied body, with Charlie Junior asleep on a blanket nearby. She was red-eyed from crying, and when Desmond knelt next to her she collapsed into his arms and spent the next hour sobbing into his shirt as he tried to comfort her. When the flow of tears slowed, he helped her to her feet and slowly took her back to the beach. Hurley had gone back ahead of them, carrying Charlie Junior, and soon Jack, Sawyer and Sayid arrived to carry the body to their makeshift cemetery.

In the days after Charlie's funeral, Claire was inconsolable. Sun, Libby and Kate took turns looking after her two little boys, while Rose and Desmond made it their mission to take care of Claire herself. Slowly, she came to accept that he was gone, and she started to go back to doing the things she normally did. And though Kate, Sun and Libby would check on her every day, her closest friend in those days was Desmond. Any time she needed to talk to someone, she would talk to him first, and he always had time for her.

It was a long, slow process, but eventually Claire had reached the point where she was basically back to normal. Quieter than before, but more like the old Claire had been. Although she did have something new in her life… she had become so close to Desmond in the months after Charlie's death, that the old feelings between them had been reawakened. They didn't become a couple straight away, as they both felt uneasy about it, but in the end, they announced to everyone else that they were together just after a year after it happened. Their daughter was born two years later, and named Megan for Charlie's mother.

The other survivors had also married and had children. Jack had finally given up on Kate, married Ana-Lucia, and they now had three children – Connor (15), Lucy (12) and Toby (10). Kate and Sawyer hadn't planned for kids, but had ended up with two of them anyway – Cassie (15) and Jamie (7).

Jin and Sun had a beautiful sixteen-year-old daughter named Tahira and a 14-year-old son, Sen. Hurley and Libby had Davey (14) and Kayleigh (11), and the youngest married couple on the island – Karl and Alex – had an eight-year-old little girl named Danielle for her grandmother. Claire's children were Aaron (just turned 17), Charlie junior (13) and Megan (8).

Sayid and Shannon had three children –Aisha (15), Adam (10) and Rebecca (8).

**A/N: Okay, if anyone noticed that this fic disappeared from my profile shortly after it was uploaded, it's because another author brought to my attention the fact that I had unknowingly copied some aspects of her story re: the Losties' children, names, how many children each couple have etc. I've now adjusted the story to remove the things that were the same/very similar. I just thought I should add something at the end to let everyone know and avoid confusion. So… SassyLostie, I apologise again, and everyone else… sorry for any inconvenience.**


	2. Chapter 2

Part One 

Cassie Ford and Aisha Jarrah were best friends. It wasn't surprising, really, they had lived next to each other all their lives, they went to school together, they spent every afternoon and every evening together. Really, they weren't that different to any other pair of fifteen-year-old girls, apart from one crucial point: They were both born on a mysterious island that seemed to be hidden from the rest of the world, after their parents had been in a plane that crashed there.

Cassie had light blonde curly hair, blue eyes just like her father, and a scattering of freckles across her nose like her mother. Aisha meanwhile had dark, straight hair and olive-coloured skin, and soft hazel eyes. The girls were just two of over a dozen children who had been born to the survivors of the Flight 815 crash. Cassie had a seven-year-old brother Jamie, and Aisha had a little brother called Adam and a sister called Rebecca. The girls were among the oldest children on the island – the eldest was Aaron Pace, whose mom had been pregnant when she got on the plane, and the other teens were Tahira Kwon, the second eldest, and Connor Shepard, who was two weeks younger than Cassie but a week older than Aisha.

Right now, the girls were sitting on the beach together, but at the other end of the beach from the main camp. They had finished their school lessons for the day, and now they were free to enjoy themselves. Unfortunately, they still had to do homework – in this case exercises in Korean to practice.

"I don't know why they make us learn this stuff, Cass. I mean, it's not like we're ever going to need to speak Korean, or Spanish like Aunt Ana-Lucia teaches."

"I think they want to keep us busy. So we don't get into trouble."

"Oh, come _on_. What trouble could we get into here?"

"Uh, there was…"

"Cass, I know the stories our parents tell about the monster made of black smoke and the mysterious "Others" on the north side of the island. Nothing like those stories has happened for years, we're safe here."

"We need to be careful though." Cassie was more serious about the dangers of the jungle than Aisha – because Cassie's parents had both been kidnapped by the "Others" and had warned her about being alone in the jungle many times.

"Yeah, I know… but I still wish they would trust us more."

"Can we talk about something else, Aish? This is getting boring."

"If you want. So…. have you got a crush on anyone?"

"Aisha!"

"You wanted to talk about something else."  
"I dunno… I really like Aaron, you know? I don't know exactly why, I just do."

"Aaron? But he's like, seventeen. Your parents will never let you be with him."

"It's not Mom and Dad I'm worried about. Have you noticed recently that Aaron and Tahira are always together?"

"Cass, we're almost always together. They're friends, that's all."

"No, it's more than that. If you've seen how they look at each other, you'd know. They're not just friends, Aish. It's more than that, I know it is."

"I dunno, Cass, I've not seen anything."

"Well, maybe if you paid attention to what other people are doing, instead of staring at Connor all the time…"

"I do not stare at him all the time!"

"Yes you do."

"Do not!"

"Do so!"

"Do not!"

"Aish, you do. I've noticed."

"I do?"

"Yeah, you do."

"I didn't think anyone had noticed…"

Then, Kate came over to where the girls were sitting. "Cass, honey, could you help me out for a bit?"

"What is it Mom?"

"I'm going to get some more water from the spring, could you watch your brother for me until I get back?"

"Can't Dad watch him?"

"Cassie, your father's busy. Please, you just have to keep an eye on him and make sure he doesn't go in the jungle or the ocean. You can sit and do your homework while you watch him, he's just playing down by the house."

"Okay, mom, I'll watch him."

"Thanks honey. Oh.. Aisha, your mother's looking for you, you might want to go and find her."

"Okay Aunty Kate."

As Kate walked away, the girls started to gather their things together, and instead sat outside the Fords' hut, watching Jamie play with Alex's little girl, Danielle.

----------------------------

Aaron Pace thought about his life a lot. His mom had told him all about what had happened while she was pregnant – how her boyfriend Thomas, his biological father, had walked out on her, and how she had been on her way to Los Angeles to have the baby (him) adopted when the plane crashed. Aaron had been raised thinking that Charlie was his father, so when his mom got pregnant again when he was four, his childish mind thought that everything was certainly going to be all right.

When Charlie died, Aaron could barely understand what had happened, though he knew something was horribly wrong and he knew his mommy was upset. From then on he saw that his mommy spending a lot of time with Uncle Desmond – events which culminated in Desmond and Aaron's mother becoming involved, and having a daughter when Aaron was nine.

He had come to accept Desmond as his… well, as his stepfather, really… in the last few years, and as he had grown up he had become a thoughtful young man, who spent a lot of time with his Uncle Jack and was well on the way to becoming the camp's doctor after Jack.

He was _also_ very good friends with Jin and Sun's daugher Tahira, who was a very beautiful sixteen-year-old. They had always been close – as they were the two eldest – but now that he was seventeen he had started to see just how beautiful she was.


	3. Chapter 3

Part Two

Every community has a few troublemakers, even if it's just a couple of boys who like pranks.

The survivors had two such boys. Granted, there wasn't much opportunity for mischief on the island, but Adam Jarrah and Toby Shepard could find a way to make trouble anywhere, and they kept their parents busy keeping an eye on them.

At least, their _mothers_ were kept busy. Jack had the excuse of running what they now called their medical centre, stocked partly with things the Others had provided, and Sayid usually managed to be conveniently busy, which meant Shannon and Ana-Lucia were left in charge of discipline. Ana-Lucia had taken to parenting effortlessly, but Shannon had taken longer to get used to the idea. She had changed a lot in the last sixteen years, and the bratty twenty-year-old who had been on the plane was long gone, but she tended to go easier on her kids… which only meant ten-year-old Adam could get away with more.

And because Adam felt that, Toby (his best friend, also ten) acted the same way. So they would think of some new prank to play on someone or other, and they would get caught, and their mothers would go through the motions of punishing them, knowing that they wouldn't stop and making sure they told the boys what was acceptable and what wasn't.

But Shannon and Ana's job wasn't made any easier by the fact that their boys idolised the teenagers – Aaron and Connor especially, but they spent most of their time tagging along after Charlie junior, Tahira's little brother Sen, and Hurley and Libby's son Davey. It helped that the older boys repeatedly told the younger ones to leave them alone. So the younger boys ended up playing together, while the teenagers hung out together and the little children played on the beach together near the houses.

Right now, Adam and Toby were hiding out near the village woodstore, waiting for Sawyer to leave. Adam, the quieter of the two, was anxious.

"Toby, are you sure about this? Shouldn't we just ask?"

"Look, if we ask a grown-up, they'll want to know why, and this is meant to be a secret, remember?"

"Yeah… I guess…"

"Well, we're okay then. Now come _on_, Uncle Sawyer's gone, we can get in there."

The boys snuck out from behind the bush they were using for cover and slipped into the woodstore. Over the next ten minutes, they removed several pieces of wood, each one a few feet in length. They pushed the lengths of wood out through a carefully-concealed hole in the wall of the store that they had made a few days ago, then quietly slipped out, checking that no-one was around before heading for the other side so they could remove their loot safely.

Unfortunately, they didn't realise that someone _had_ seen them exit the woodstore, and was waiting for them. As they turned the corner, they saw him leaning against the wall, hands in his pockets and eyes half-closed, seemingly just enjoying the sun. The boys crept forward, and started to pull the first piece of wood towards away from him, but just as Toby started to drag it forward, he used his foot to stop the wood moving. "Well, now what have we here? You boys up to something?"

"Uncle Sawyer… uh, we were just…"

"…we were just about to put this back in the store, right Toby?" Adam said quickly, trying to look innocent.

"Yeah. I'm sure you were. What was really going on?"

"Really, Uncle Sawyer, we were putting it them away."

"Boys, I know ya weren't, and I know ya lyin', so just come out with it and tell me the truth." Sawyer paused for a moment to look each of them in the eyes. "Or I'll tell ya parents."

"No!" said both boys at the same time. Then Toby spoke. "Please don't do that."

"Why shouldn't I? I know your daddy wouldn't be too pleased, Toby, and I'm pretty sure yours wouldn't either, Adam. And, well, I don't want you two setting a bad example for my Jamie, he's at a very impressionable age."

"We weren't putting the logs back."

"That's right, Toby. Now what were y'all doing?"

"We were gonna use them to build our hideout."

"You two have a hideout? Where?"

"We were gonna."

"Where?"

"Why d'ya wanna know?"

"You know, I think I see your daddy over there, Toby Shepard. I'll just call him over, shall I?"

"No! We found this really cool spot, near this lake where there's a waterfall and everything. We were gonna build a little hut there."

"If you're talkin' about where I think you're talkin' about, that lake's pretty far into the jungle. And you kids aren't supposed to go there without a grown-up. So?"

"We snuck away a few times. No-one ever notices."

"Well, they'll be noticin' now, I can promise ya that."

"Uncle Sawyer, you're not gonna tell mom and dad about us tryin' to steal the wood, are you?"  
"No, kiddo. But I am goin' ta tell them that you two have been sneaking off into the jungle. And Adam, I'll be havin' a word with your folks, too."

"Do you have to?"

"Yes. 'cos otherwise your moms and dads will be on my back, wondering why I didn't tell 'em 'bout you two, when you end up bein' attacked by a polar bear or a boar or something."

"Oh… I guess you're right."

"Yeah, I am. Now, let's find those parents o'yours."

Sawyer stepped away from the wood store, looking around the beach for a moment until he spotted Jack talking to Ana-Lucia on the steps of their house not far away. He turned to the boys. "Well, looks like they're just over there, Toby. Now, you comin'?"

"Yes Uncle Sawyer."

"Okay then. Adam, you may as well come too."

They walked over to the Shepards' house, Sawyer making sure he walked behind the boys so they didn't try to run off. They soon reached the house, just as Ana-Lucia went inside.

"Doc, you got a minute?"

"What is it, Sawyer?"

"Got a little problem you might be interested in."

"Sawyer, I'm tired, what is it?"

"Ya might want to ask your son that."

"Toby? What happened?"

Toby stepped closer to his dad, feeling very nervous. "Me an' Adam went in the jungle without tellin' anyone."

"Just now? When, Toby?"

"A few times."

"And where did you go?"

"There's this lake with a waterfall. By there."

At this point, Sawyer interrupted. "They were planning' on building a hideout there. I found 'em taking some bits of wood 'n'stuff from the store."

"Thanks, Sawyer. I thought Toby knew he wasn't to go into the jungle, but apparently not."

"I'm sorry, Dad."

"You know you'll have to be punished."

"Yes, Dad."

"Okay, son. Now go inside, and help your mom with dinner."

"Yes, Dad."

"Adam, I think I'll have a word with your parents as well. Sawyer, did you tell Sayid and Shannon yet?"

"Nah, you were the closest. I was goin' to go now."

"I'll come with you. Adam, come on."

They couldn't find Sayid, but they found Shannon easily. She was sitting outside her house, braiding her youngest daughter's hair, when they arrived. Jack spoke first.

"Shan, have you got a minute?"

"Hang on, Jack, I just need to finish this braid." She quickly tied the end of a braid with an old hairband. "There. Now, Becca, you go and play, Uncle Jack needs to talk to me."

The little girl patted her new braids quickly. "Thanks mommy."

"No playing in the jungle, remember. And no going in the ocean."

"Yes mommy." As she ran off to find her friends, Shannon gestured to Jack, Sawyer and Adam to sit down. "So, what's wrong?"

"Sawyer found out that Adam and Toby have been sneaking off into the jungle alone. Without telling anyone. They were planning to build some kind of hideout by the lake."

"Adam, is this true?"

"Yes, mom."

"Adam, you know you're not to do that. Your father's told you so many times now, please try to remember."

"Yes mom."

"I'll have to tell him, you know. This isn't like playing a silly prank, Adam, this could get you hurt, or worse. And you'll have to be punished."

"I know, mom. I'm sorry."

"Okay, now go inside and get that homework done. I'll decide on your punishment later, when I speak to your dad."

"Yes, mom." He got up and went inside the house, leaving the adults alone.

"Thanks for this. I try to keep an eye on him, but it's hard. I mean, Aisha's a good girl, I can trust her to listen to me, and Becca's too young to be getting into trouble. I just don't quite know how to deal with boys. I'm glad I've got you two, and Kate and Ana-Lucia and everyone else around, I don't know what I'd do without you."

"Don't worry, Shan, it's no problem. And Adam will grow out of this, it's just a phase. Wait till he gets older, you'll see."


	4. Chapter 4

Part Three

Claire and Kate were working in the laundry area together, doing their best to get their family's clothes clean. The survivors didn't have much by way of cleaning products, but the supply drops that happened every few months usually included some form of detergent, which they improvised with to handwash their clothes. No-one minded, though, as the time it took to wash clothes kept them occupied, and gave something to think about. Also, scrubbing stains out of clothes by hand was a good punishment for errant children, as they'd learnt from experience. But for the adults it was an opportunity to catch up, and talk, and share gossip.

Right now, the only occupants of the laundry were Claire, Kate and Alex, though she was working alone and off to one side. This left the two friends time to talk.

"I had the nightmare again last night."

"Oh no… are you all right?"

"Yeah, I am now. It just felt so real, like I was really back there…"

"You will be okay, you know. Eventually, you'll be okay, and the nightmares will stop."

"You think so? Because I'm having difficulty believing that right now."

Kate put down the top she had been cleaning, and gently lifted the skirt her friend held out of her hands, making Claire face her. "Hey, you'll be okay. We all care about you, Claire, we're all here to take care of you. You've got Des, and me, and Sawyer and Jack and Rose and everyone else, and you've got your kids. You'll get through this."

"I guess I will… I'm glad I have everyone here though, I don't think I'd make it by myself."

"Well, luckily for you, you don't need to think about that, because that will never be the case. We'll always be there for you."

Claire smiled weakly. "I know." Then she picked up the next piece of clothing she had to wash. "I'm grateful."

-------------------------

Jack was working in his little medical centre - a far cry from the well-stocked hospital he had once worked in, but more than he could have hoped for. Since the Truce, the Others had agreed to let them have some of the medical equipment, and they shared the drugs and first-aid gear that arrived with each supply drop.

At the moment he was inventorying the supplies, to see how much they had left and whether it would last until the next drop, which was due in a couple of weeks. He was so absorbed in his work that he didn't register Desmond's arrival.

"Hello, brother."

"Oh, Desmond, I didn't see you come in."

"You seemed pretty intent on what you were doing."

"I was just doing an inventory, that's all. Was there something you wanted?"

"I don't know how much you can do… I'm worried about Claire."

"What's wrong with her?"

"She still has the nightmares… about Charlie, you know? I always reassure her afterwards, and make sure she knows I'm here for her, but recently it just seems like the nightmares are happening more and more often. It's almost every night now."

"I really don't know how much I can do… I have a few sleeping pills she could take.."

"No offence, but I don't really want to fill her up with pills. That won't help her get over it."

"Um… when she had amnesia, she recovered from that after Libby hypnotised her… maybe ask Libby to help? She was a psychologist once, she might be able to do something."

"Yea, that sounds like it might actually help.. thanks, brother, I'll do that."

"No problem."

As Desmond walked away down the beach looking for Libby, Jack smiled to himself. When he had first found out about Claire and Desmond being together, he had been worried for his younger (half-)sister, because she was quite a bit younger than Desmond, but the last few years had shown him that he really was taking very good care of Claire.


End file.
